I had suffered some injuries –
scrapes and abrasions – to the front of my chest. Only one cut
required attention – a vertical gash on the aureole of my right
breast, just above the nipple. A doctor had examined me, cleaned
my wounds, and stitched the gash with two or three stitches of
black string. At the time I had wondered how much the stitches
would cost. I thought there was probably a set charge for each
stitch, but I wondered if there was a sliding scale depending on
the financial situation of the patient. Perhaps poor people had
to pay little or nothing for such services. I thought, however,
since the doctor would have known I was a lawyer, as usual I
would have to pay the maximum amount.

At the moment I was sitting in
a room on the second story of a house, examining my stitches. I
was concerned because it appeared that the stitches had only been
sewn into the lower portion of my cut, and that the top half of the
gash was still open. I realized if the wound healed like
that, I would have a noticeable, albeit small, scar – something
I didn't want.

I considered returning to the
doctor to express my concern. I knew people often didn't
complain to professionals, such as doctors, about perceived
mistakes, preferring to defer to the professional's supposed
expertise. But I knew even professionals made mistakes, and
I had few qualms about returning to the doctor and having my
wound re-examined.

However, I now realized I
might not have to return to the doctor who had originally given
me the stitches, because outside my door I thought I could hear
the footsteps of another doctor – a doctor whom I knew.

I was lying on the floor so
I couldn't see outside the door, but I knew just out
of sight was a staircase leading down to the ground floor. I
could hear footsteps coming up the stairs, and I quickly asked
someone standing by the door to ask the person coming up the
stairs to come in to see me. The person by the door complied with
my request, and the person who had been on the stairs appeared in
the doorway.

This was the person I knew: a
young woman (not more than 18-19 years old) who looked
exactly like the actress Claire Danes. She hesitated, as if reluctant to
enter. Since I knew she was a doctor (even as young as she
was), I pointed to my wound and appealed to her medical
sensibilities until she relented and walked over to me. I quickly
explained my concern about my wound and a possible scar, and she
just as quickly advised me that I had nothing to worry about, and
that my wound would heal properly.

By now she was sitting on the
floor facing me. I found her extremely attractive and I was happy
to have her in front of me. I wanted to use this opportunity to
explain something to her.

She and I weren't
strangers. We had known each other for a while, and during that
time she had developed a strong crush for me. I, however, had
rebuffed her, obviously injuring her in the process. This was why
she had been reluctant to come in the room to see me. She was
still hurting from my rejection, and she didn't want to be
around me. I however didn't feel the same about her. In fact, I
liked her company immensely and I found her so attractive that
even now I just wanted to put my arms around her and pull her
close to me. But when I reached toward her and placed a hand on
each shoulder, she visibly stiffened, and although she didn't
make me remove my hands from her shoulders, she obviously wouldn't move any closer to me.

I began to explain why I had
rejected her. I thought the reason was much different than what
she expected. It was not because I had thought I was too good for
her. Au contraire: I thought she was too good for me.

To me, she seemed almost
perfect. She was already a doctor. She had no faults that I could
perceive. She lived an upright hard-working life,
uncompromisingly attaining her goals. She was the model of a life
which I could only imagine from the outside. Although she had
somehow conceived some passion for me, I realized we were so
different, such a union had no chance. I wasn't disciplined, not
moral, not persistently dedicated to my work. In her I could see
only the type of person I had never been.

Still trying to ease her pain
because of my rejection, I assured her she would find a
young man more like herself. I even imagined a strong
blonde-haired Aryan type. I could see the two of them together in
a circle of friends, the likes of which I had never had, and
would never have.

The thought of the couple did
set my mind to thinking, however, how it was possible to tell a
lot about a person by simply looking at the person's mate.
Passing through my memory, I thought back on
Conn, who had been my classmate in junior high school. I had never known
Conn well, or
what kind of person she was. She had always seemed like the shy
homely retiring type, but she had married a fellow who had been a
bit the opposite of her – a good-looking outgoing fellow. It had
been a big surprise to me when I had heard, those many years ago,
whom she had married, but it had made me change my opinion of who
Conn was.

I thought of myself and

Carolina. It suddenly became clearer to me that I had
given almost no thought of trying to understand who I was by
trying to understand who Carolina was. My attention was mostly
focused on myself, almost to the exclusion of Carolina. But I now
saw that if I really wanted to understand myself, I would do well
to take a closer look at Carolina, and understand who she was.